Then the LORD answered Job - out of the whirlwind and said :
“ Who is this who obscures My counsel by words without knowledge ?
Now brace yourself like a man ; I will question you , and you shall inform Me.
Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth ? Tell (Me) , if you have understanding ....
Who fixed its measurements ? Surely you know ! Or who stretched a measuring line across it ?
- On what were its foundations set , or who laid vvv its cornerstone ,
while the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy ?
Who enclosed the sea behind doors when it burst forth from the womb ... ,
when I made the clouds its garment and thick darkness its blanket ,
when I fixed ... its boundaries and set in place its bars and doors ,
and I declared : ‘ You may come this far ... , but no farther ; here your proud waves must stop ’ ?
In your days , have you commanded the morning or assigned the dawn its place ,
that it might spread to the ends of the earth and shake the wicked out of it ?
The earth takes shape like clay (under) a seal ; its hills stand out like the folds of a garment.
Light is withheld from the wicked , and their upraised arm is broken.
Have you journeyed to the vents of the sea or walked in the trenches of the deep ?
Have the gates of death been revealed Have you seen the gates of the shadow of death ?
Have you surveyed ... the extent of the earth ? Tell (Me) , if you know all this.
Where ... is the way to the home of light ? Do you know where ... darkness resides ,
so you can lead it back to its border ? ... Do you know the paths to its home ?
Surely you know , for you were already born ! And the number of your days is great !
Have you entered ... the storehouses of snow or observed the storehouses of hail ,
which I hold in reserve for times of trouble , for the day of war and battle ?
In which ... direction is the lightning dispersed , or the east wind scattered over the earth ?
Who cuts a channel for the flood or clears a path for the thunderbolt ,
to bring rain on a barren ... land , on a desert where no man (lives)
to satisfy the parched wasteland and make it sprout ... with tender grass ?
Does the rain have a father ? ... Who has begotten the drops of dew ?
From whose womb does the ice emerge ? Who gives birth to the frost from heaven ,
when the waters become hard as stone and the surface of the deep is frozen ?
Can you bind the chains of the Pleiades or loosen the belt of Orion ?
Can you bring forth the constellations in their seasons or lead out the Bear and her cubs ?
Do you know the laws of the heavens ? ... Can you set their dominion over the earth ?
Can you command ... the clouds so that a flood of water covers you ?
Can you send the lightning bolts on their way ? Do they report ‘ Here we are ’ ?
Who has put wisdom in the heart or ... given understanding to the mind ?
Who has the wisdom to count the clouds ? Or who can tilt the water jars of the heavens
when the dust hardens into a mass and the clods of earth stick together ?
Can you hunt the prey for a lioness or satisfy the hunger of young lions
when they crouch in their dens and lie in wait in the thicket ?
Who provides food for the raven when its young cry out to God as they wander about for lack of food ? (’’)